Influence of oxygen fraction on the characteristics of titanium oxide coatings obtained by the magnetron method

Titanium oxide coatings were obtained by magnetron sputtering on a glass substrate with different oxygen fraction in the plasma. Studies were carried out by scanning electron microscopy of the obtained coating samples establishing the role of oxygen in the process of crystallization of TiOx-coatings. It was found that with increasing the oxygen fraction in the vacuum arc discharge plasma the crystal grain size increases, the time of coating on the substrate increases, and the crystal layer has a columnar structure. The presence of amorphous and crystalline phase for all coating samples was revealed, with the predominance of the former. On the surface microphotographs of the coatings microcraters were found, on the surface of the samples obtained at the concentration of O2 in the plasma 14% of their concentration is maximum, this can be explained by changes in the state of the plasma, starting to occur at this concentration of reaction gas. Vacuum photonic annealing of the obtained coatings was performed. Vacuum radiation annealing in the furnace led to modification of coatings: sintering of coatings, increase of their crystallinity. An increase in crystallite size in a sample with an oxygen fraction of 12% was detected.

Design and Experimental Study of Space Continuous Robots Applied to Space Non-Cooperative Target Capture

Space capture actuators face problems such as insufficient flexibility and electrical components that are vulnerable to extreme space environments. To address these problems, a centralized-driven flexible continuous robot based on a multiple scissor mechanism units is proposed in this study. The continuous robot body is composed of two scissor mechanism units coupled in series, and the base container’s three motors to drive the robot. The two scissor mechanism units ensure a wide range of flexible operations and the light weight of the robot. The centralized drive with three motors not only reduces the number of driving sources, but also ensures temperature control and protection of electrical components in the space environment. The kinematics and dynamics of the robot are analyzed, and the workspace and deformation performance of the robot are verified through experiments. Compared with other continuous robots, the proposed continuous robot retains the characteristics of continuous robots in a wide range of flexible operations. At the same time, the configuration is light and a small number of driving sources are used, which is suitable for extreme temperatures, vacuum, radiation, and strict resource-constrained environments in space.

The Density Matrix: Bloch Equations

One of the most powerful tools for calculating quantum device performance is based on the density matrix operator. The operator is unique because it is time dependent in the Schrödinger picture. The approach is quite general, but in the systems of interest here, the Hilbert space of the operator includes both the quantum system such as a nano-vibrator or two-level system and the quantized vacuum radiation field. The equation of motion follows from the time dependent Schrödinger equation. It is possible, as we show, to include the generation of spontaneous emission in this system and then, because observables of interest do not depend on the vacuum field, trace over the vacuum field to create a new density matrix called the reduced density matrix. The resulting equations of motion are the Bloch equations. We use these equations to analyze several problems involving two- and three-level systems.